Kitchener needs to spend $250M to meet net-zero target by 2050
Kitchener councillors want to see the city reach its new net-zero target by 2050, but it will come at a cost.
Councillors have endorsed the target, part of an updated corporate climate action plan that’s expected to be formally approved at council on Monday.
The city’s new net-zero goal — where any greenhouse gasses emitted are equal to the amount being removed from the atmosphere — improves on a previously adopted corporate target of an 80 per cent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
The City of Waterloo became the first municipality to formally adopt a corporate net-zero target this past week.
Kitchener looks to reduce emissions by eight per cent by 2026; a report says the city saw a five per cent reduction in 2023 from the 2016 baseline.
And as corporate sustainability officer Anna Marie Cipriani recently told councillors, it’s going to require a lot of money — an estimated $10 million a year until 2050 — to reach net-zero. “We know that it’s going to be a significant capital investment in order to make progress.”
Existing technological innovations are lowering costs and producing energy savings today, Cipriani noted, and future technologies should continue to increase efficiency.
“What we’re seeing is a decrease in energy costs per metre squared, and a decrease in the energy demand per square metre across the facilities,” amounting to a 13 per cent reduction in cost per square metre.
Despite the challenges posed by the net-zero goal, Cipriani said it’s doable.
“Sometimes when you hear the term net-zero, you may think ‘Ooh, aspirational, visionary.’ I want to assure you that the plan that is before you … is very practical and a very executable plan.”
The plan lists 47 actions to take by 2027 in areas such as the city’s fleet, facilities and equipment, which combined generate 90 per cent of corporate emissions.
A report notes the city will likely need to use several funding avenues to finance the plan, including “pursuing external grant funding opportunities, utilizing ongoing funding from the city’s energy reserve fund, potentially issuing debt, and consideration of other funding strategies.”
A one per cent property tax hike
would bring in an additional $1.6 million a year.
Coun. Jason Deneault acknowledged the hefty cost — and pointed out younger people present at the meeting.
“At the end, the goal, you can’t put a price tag on that goal, which is … to have a world that’s viable for them.”
Coun. Scott Davey said it’s a target they hope is achievable, but it comes with a lot of unknowns.
“It’s contingent on the emerging technological solutions,” he said. “It’s also contingent on us being able to leverage grants from senior levels of government. If that doesn’t happen, then we’re going to be in trouble in terms of finding the funding here as well.”
Davey said the prospect of issuing debt also makes him nervous.
Kitchener is one of only two Ontario municipalities to own a natural gas utility, which brings in millions of dollars to fund city services.
A separate process is ongoing to develop a Kitchener Utilities clean energy transition strategy, but it’s not yet known what the utility will look like in the future, and how it transitions in a world that’s striving to reduce its reliance on conventional fossil fuels.